Ajoka Theatre Festival from 17th

LAHORE Celebrating the 100 years of International Women Day, Ajoka Theatre will come up with a two-day theatre festival on the issues facing by the women at Alhamra Hall, The Mall. Ajoka Director Madeeha Gauhar told TheNation the festival would start on March 17 wherein Ajoka will present its two best theatre plays including 'Kala Maida Bhes and 'Dukh Darya. She said it was the need of the hour to highlight the issues facing by the women through all forms of the art including drama, film, theatre and fine arts. She said it was common phenomena that women were being exploited in the name of honour and treated as property. She said Ajoka always touched the burning issues of the society and presented its plays as 'Art for Life. Written by Shahid Nadeem and Directed by Madeeha Gauhar, the play 'Kala Maida Bhes is based on a real life incident that took place in Sindh, where a woman was exchanged for an ox. The play takes place in a village in the Cholistan desert, where drinking water is scarce and the powerful and exploitative Peer controls the only well. The custom of Wata Sata is used reprehensibly to exchange a woman for a bull is only too eloquently under lined. The aridity of the desert is juxtaposed against the barrenness of the protagonist 'Sundri and water against fertility. The other play 'Dukh Darya is based on an incident which took place years ago. A Kashmiri woman, taunted and tormented for being infertile, is driven to jump into the river dividing the two parts of the disputed territory of Kashmir. However, she ends up on the other side of the border, is arrested, interrogated and eventually raped. She gets pregnant, a proof of the horror of rape in custody but also belying the allegations of infertility.